The Wrestling Observer reported people inside Lucha Underground were pushing for Vince Russo to get an interview to join the writing team when he visits Los Angeles this weeke. Producer Eric Van Wagenen is cited as specifically pushing to bring Vince Russo in. Van Wagenen went on Twitter to say the story is false. Meltzer explained the story a bit more on his podcast. He says he was told three different stories by different people: 1) Russo is definitely coming to LA for an interview, 2) Russo is coming for an interview but everyone will deny it because he’s Vince Russo, and 3) Russo is not officially coming for an interview but everyone figures there will at least be an informal one since he’s there. Meltzer frames this – and discussion of bringing in names like Torrie Wilson and Victoria – as part of a larger ideological debate inside the group: there’s people who want to stay the course and there’s those who would like to load up on more ex-WWE names and start touring right way. (Meltzer is highly dismissive of the later strategy, pointing to TNA’s failure.)

Vince Russo had announced going to Los Angeles for an autograph signing, a Q&A and a podcast with Melissa Santos for his website. Russo’s pay site launched last year has reinvented him as a weird artifact of a previous age, with a few people still interested in him car accident style and many more still holding him in utter disdain. (Even this story existing at all has people in uproar.) Russo hasn’t been part of a successful wrestling writing time in decades, but has successfully managed to keep the the myth of his success and his role into it very strong despite many subsequent years of failures.

I don’t think there’s anything to this, but then I could be blinded by own dislike for Vince Russo and it’s clear some people inside wrestling feel positive about him for whatever reason. I just wrote a long thing about the trust I have in the people who are running Lucha Underground now, but that doesn’t extend to a project with Vince Russo. (They’d likely keep it as quiet as possible if he did get involved because of the tremendous negative stigma, but it’d become obvious in the product just like it did last time with TNA.)

And maybe it’s all moot. As of right now, Lucha Underground still hasn’t officially been picked up for a second season. They’ve got 24 hours taped, they’ll have 4 more done this weekend. It appears they have a lot of stuff mapped out for the last 11 of the 39 episodes agreed to for season 1, so any affect any new writer would be minimal at this point – even if they blew things up, it’d be really late to start a new direction and get it to far enough along to mean something. Any change would make more sense to start season two, and we still don’t know that there is a season two.

The Wrestling Observer also reported that Flamita may end up being the mystery guy in Queretaro. That’s the rumor I’ve been hearing as well, but everyone’s still in the same position they were back in September: Flamita likes working in Dragon Gate and wants to stay there full time, AAA wants him to come there full time. AAA could use Flamita just when he happens to be in Mexico, but that’s not often on a Dragon Gate schedule. The other thing is, and this is mostly my speculation, but AAA doesn’t want to be a treated as a second choice promotion. It’s fine with Alberto, because Alberto’s getting pulled in a bunch of directions at once and AAA figures Alberto will have a relationship with AAA for the long term even if he’s not there all the time right now. Flamita’s not Alberto and AAA probably feels they’re a bigger deal than Dragon Gate (especially for a Mexican) and Flamita should be thrilled to work for the big hometown promotion. (I don’t know if they are or are not bigger – I don’t know how you actually measure that.) It may just be a generational thing, or the legacy of the Promo Azteca guys going to Nitro, but I see interviews with all sorts of luchadors who usually they feel that the biggest accomplishment possible is to wrestle internationally. It’s very rarely about being on top in one of the two Mexican promotions, which must be a quite different viewpoint than if you’re one of the people involved in running those promotions.

Chilanga did well in Puebla a month ago so they’re back again quick. Rey Apocalipsis, who was really good in a few appearances late last year on Puebla TV makes his debut with this group. Cool to see Asturiano in a big match as well. Opener is Police vs Police!